If you end up with unspent money, you should be REWARDED next year, NOT ENCOURAGED TO WASTE IT.
In this case it’s not being put to use, not because it isn’t needed.
My DCH gave a $100 M grant to +++ -—— Health to build a data warehouse anchored by Medicaid and SHBP data but with a lot of other data in it.
+++ could not find competent people to staff the project. They went through over 20 leadership people and none of them knew what to do. They went through 100 workers in the trenches with a max of 75 on board at one time. 3 or 4 of the 75 knew what to do. But leadership would not listen to them because they were not hired with the label LEADER.
The official project started May 2018. Aug 2019 we cancelled the project. Between 80 and 90 million will probably not be spent and returned to CMS. Maybe a little over $10M will go to +++ and to the software tools they bought/leased.
I blame our K-PHD public education system for the incompetence of the people hired by +++. They had all the right education credentials... but did not know what to do.
Sesame Street has a game where they show 3 activities and ask:
Which is first?
Which is second?
Which is last?
+++ failed at that Sesame Street game.